crashing hard

2 am, winter, 1997
feverish and crashing hard
the world around me comes in sinuous waves
i form the void inside to squash the cycle of darkness (far off, a child's voice laughs, an echo)
and as i have done so many times before i light a candle
in that voidconcentrate
the room is freezingso cold
-- then -- something is different, something has gone wrong with
this 'exercise'
dark spots, moving, living spots
darkness blackens the candle, i see a shifting mass of
distilled sadness?
the Dark
light, help me.
the darkness penetrates the void, mocking the emptiness
as light illuminates a room so can Dark illuminate a void
mocking the emptiness
encasing me in ice
reach for the last glimpse of the flickering light
my stomach twists
it changes again
the light is warm Warm Hot
I am hot
suddenly I am tearing at something
I don't know what or how
cobwebs made of steel
moonbeams carved from stone
they crumble at my touch, but I have touched nothing
the shrivel and melt with the heat that surges through me, heat
like a forge fire, heat like the world burning, heat like --

it is gone
the room is solid around me
i touch my forehead expecting beads of sweat, but there is nothing
i am alone
the phone is off the hook
trembling slightly, I replace it

3 am
paging through my address book
with a start I realize I have no true close friends
- where have they gone?
there was a time when I knew that at any hour there were a handful
of people who would come to me, talk to me, hold me
at any hour
for any reason
as I would for them
- where have they gone?
trembling

4am
hot water beats down on my shoulders
a torrent washing away tears I didn't know were there
it changes nothing
I return to the room
the lake shimmers with early morning fog

I form the Void inside me again
and fill it with light
this time the darkness does not come
i am the light
a single bud of a flower
only that
only the bud
i see it in every detail
smell it
feel it
every vein of every leaf, every curve of every petal
i feel the sap pulsing
feel it know it be it
i am the bud
i reach out
the bud reaches out
light
light pressing on the petals
my petals unfold, turning toward the light
the Light
absorbing the light
the rose and the light are one
i am the light
the circle closes
draw the light through me, gather it into me
a circle of pure light and power
wait until i am ready
nothing so arbitrary as counting
something shifts
channel the light to a purpose
make a tiny break in the circleand
pour the light out

if there were a candle I could light it with a thought
if there were a breeze I could still it with a whisper
(or swirl it into a cyclone)
if there were a storm I could direct each raindrop with a touch
or form the ground into mountains or canyons
fire air water and earth

if there were a love I could show her purest light
and share it

light is the universal

but
right now it is irrelevant that it has nowhere to go
that i have no-one to send it to
it is enough to be in control of it
rather than controlled
a paradox, really
I must control it, to avoid being controlled - and thus
I am controlled.